Blair's Epiphany
by believin'inluv
Summary: Can a classic movie make Blair realize who she is truly in love with? CB. Based on TV show after ep 13.


**Disclaimer: I do not own Gossip Girl or "Gone ****With**** The Wind". "Gone With ****The**** Wind" belongs ****to Margaret Mitchell and not ****me. ****The exact quotes from the movie belong to David L. Selznick and ****the "Gone With the Wind" screenplay authors and ****not me. **

**This is a short story**** about Chuck and Blair (best GG couple ever!)****, based on the TV show. It takes place after "The Thin Line ****Between**** Chuck and Nate". Please R&R. I'm open to strict critique but no flames, please!**

** Blair's Epiphany**

Blair Waldof stared wide-eyed at her television set. On a normal Saturday mornings, she would have been out shopping for new clothes and accessories. She loved New York, but she hadn't felt like going anywhere after her reputation had been destroyed.

Serena had called her to hang out, but she just wanted a day to herself. She wanted to hide under a blanket and watch a classic romance movie, wishing that she lived in it instead of her own crazy world.

After everyone had found out about her flings with Chuck and Nate, Blair had just wanted to run away from it all. Away from the eyes of an internet stalker, away from the voices of her ex-followers, away from the man she loved and the man she gave everything to. Her best friend Serena had convinced her otherwise. Blair _would _fight for her reputation back, but it would take some serious recuperation first.

Romance movies always soothed her. From her favorite Audrey Hepburn to Meg Ryan, they always cheered her up. Blair had gone to her movie cabinet that morning, needing one of those movies. They gave her hope that one day she would find true love and be happy, an emotion that she hadn't truly felt in years.

She thought had found a true love in Nate. Nate Archibald, the crystal-blue eyed, blonde haired boy that every woman wanted and every man wanted to be. He was such a handsome gentleman, the perfect catch. She thought _he _was her prince charming, her true love, her kindred spirit. She had convinced herself, and everyone else, of that fact for years. Then Chuck Bass came along.

Blair could picture him in her head right now. His eyes the color of deep chocolate, looking straight at her as if he could see into her soul. His one eyebrow arched, convincing her that he had something good to tell her. His mouth in the form of a sexy smirk, one that both annoyed her and drew her closer to him in fascination. His dark brown hair, not too long but not too short, as soft as the most expensive velvet. His face was pale, but warm and familiar.

That was the man she had lost her virginity to. The devil of the Upper East Side, the womanizer, the bad seed…there were so many names people called him. He was the exact opposite of a gentleman. Yet she had given it all to him one night in a limo, and had ruined her life forever. She had lost Nate and her reputation because of Chuck Bass.

She should hate him, but she didn't. Even after he sent the text message to Gossip Girl. Even after he told her that he didn't want her anymore, and spoke the cruelest words anyone had ever said to her. No, she didn't hate him. She just wanted to forget him. She wanted to leave it all behind.

_"You tried to leave him, remember? That worked out real well," _Blair's mind would tell her. She would try to shut up the other half of her brain that reminded her of the time when she made out with Nate at the Cotillion in front of Chuck. She had seen him standing at the top of the stairs out of the corner of her eye. He hadn't moved, he had just stood there and watched them in silence. She had closed her eyes and focused on Nate's lips, ignoring how he felt.

After all, Chuck never would have cared. She was just another one of the women he had slept with. It wouldn't have mattered for him to see her making out with his best friend. It wouldn't have mattered to him when he found out that they had sex. It wouldn't have mattered. It _shouldn't _have mattered.

_"If you didn't matter to him, then why did he send the text to Gossip Girl?" _the annoying voice in her head returned. _"Why else would you have the dream?" _

Ever since she had sex with Nate, Blair had had a reoccurring dream in which she saw Chuck. In the dream, she would see him (with blurred vision) standing in Central Park. The sky was grey and she could feel a cold winter wind stinging her face. His back was turned to her, his red and yellow scarf blowing behind his broad shoulders. He would turn slowly and face her, dressed in a black jacket and matching pants. He casually held a lit cigarette in his hand, and she could smell the smoke hanging in the air. His dark brown eyes looked at her, only they weren't the confident, pinning eyes of Chuck Bass. They looked like those of a dog that had just been kicked: saddened, hurt, and unwanted. She wanted to run to him and ask him what was wrong. She wanted to know why the boy with no heart looked so broken. But then she would wake up.

She hated that dream, because Chuck was never supposed to be in her dreams. It was only supposed to be Nate, picking her up and looking at her with glistening blue eyes. He was supposed to carry her away with strong, muscular arms and live happily ever after, like a prince out of a fairy tale.

The Nate dreams had ended when she realized that he didn't love her. She thought that they would return when he did, on her seventeenth birthday. He had let her down. He _always _let her down. Yet she forgave him. She always convinced the other side of her brain that he loved her the way that she loved him.

Blair stared at the bright picture on her television screen, sighing heavily. She never wanted to think about it ever again. Why did her heart always hurt so much, no matter what?

The movie wasn't helping. It was a classic, "Gone With the Wind." Blair had heard of both the book and the movie before, but she had never read or seen either one. Her mom had suggested it to her that morning.

"You always watch the same old Audrey Hepburn," Eleanor had commented. "Why not something different? I always loved 'Gone With the Wind.'" Blair had looked at the dusty box of the movie with disapproval. It looked like it took place in an older time. She decided to give it a chance, though. After all, the guy on the box looked handsome and he was about to kiss a brunette girl. Any romance was fine with Blair.

She had put it in and couldn't believe the resemblance between her and Miss Scarlett, the main character. Scarlet was the rich, spoiled beauty who could take control of a situation if she needed to. Blair saw that in herself. She had always been in control of her life--at least, up until recently. Plus, like Miss Scarlet, Blair knew that she could be petulant.

As the film went on, Blair found the story becoming more and more like her life. Miss Scarlett wanted the love of a handsome man, Ashley Wilkes. Ashley was blonde and kind, not forceful in tone or attitude at all. Blair couldn't help think of Nate. Then there was Rhett Butler, the tall, dark and handsome man. He had been everywhere, and he had a certain knowing smirk that reminded Blair all too well of Chuck. Rhett's phrases and attitude reminded her of Chuck as well, although she wished with all of her might that he would never enter her thoughts again.

The plot became more depressing, yet more familiar as she watched. Ashley couldn't make up his mind on whether he wanted Scarlet or his wife. Blair kept thinking of Nate, who could never make up his mind about anything. He told Blair he loved her, yet he had sex with Serena. He wanted the rich life, yet he said also that he wanted something else. It seemed like Nate could never decide on anything.

There came a scene in which Rhett had told Scarlett that he loved her. She hadn't cared, of course, only wanting Ashley. Blair's stomach twisted in a knot as she heard their exchange.

"There's one thing I do know. And that's that I love you Scarlett. In spite of you, and me, and the whole silly world going to pieces around us I love you. Because we are alike, bad lots both of us. Selfish and shrewd. I think we can look things in the eyes and call them by their right names." Blair couldn't help but think of Chuck's deep voice, whispering those words in her ear. But he couldn't care about her.

_"Yeah, he couldn't care. That's why he sent the message," _the annoying voice stated again.

"Don't hold me like that!" Scarlett exclaimed on the television. Rhett looked down at her with a pinning stare that made Blair sweat just putting herself in Scarlet's place. She blinked and when she looked up again she swore that she saw Chuck's eyes instead of Rhett's.

"Scarlett, look at me," Rhett's voice crooned. Blair's wide eyes were on him as she listened intently. "I love you more than I've ever loved any woman. And I've waited for you longer than I have any other woman."

Blair's mouth dropped open at his words. When had Chuck ever bought necklaces for any other girl besides her? When was the last time he had sex with the same girl twice?

"Never mind about loving me," she heard Rhett say over her thoughts. She took a few deep breaths, trying not to think about Chuck. That was when Rhett pulled Scarlett in and kissed her, in front of a fire-lit sky from the burning town of Atlanta miles away.

Blair blinked and wiped the tears that were falling out of her eyes. She thought back to Rhett's words and realized that Rhett and Scarlett were her and Chuck. They were both bad lots, him in a man-whore way and her in a bitchy way. Both always looked out for themselves. Both were stuck in the whole silly world of the Upper East Side. And just like Rhett had rescued Scarlett in the previous scene, Chuck had always been there to rescue Blair.

She stopped crying, realizing how foolish she must look. Then she realized that her stomach didn't feel so good. It couldn't be…

_"No," _she thought. The butterflies were back again. She thought she could murder them. But they seemed ever-living, indestructible.

Blair ignored them as best as she could, and continued watching the movie. Rhett and Scarlett got married, and they always argued. Blair remembered how she and Chuck argued about Nate. She thought back to what he said on her seventeenth birthday.

"All this talk about how you have to be with Nate or the world will end. Face it: it's over," Chuck had said. In her heart Blair had known he was right, but she wasn't willing to admit it to herself.

Soon it was near the end of the movie. Ashley's wife had died, and Scarlett had thrown herself upon him, bawling. Rhett had seen this and left. Blair remembered herself standing on the stairs, tongue-wrestling with Nate as Chuck looked on. She knew she was going to snap. It was all torturing her.

"Oh Ashley, you really do love her, don't you?" Scarlett asked the blonde man in front of her.

"She's the only dream I've ever had," Ashley spoke of his dying wife Melly, "to die in the face of reality."

"Dreams, always dreams with you. Never common sense!" Scarlett said back. Blair remembered how Nate would always dream up different things, and never decide which dream he wanted to follow. Chuck always thought one step ahead of everyone in every situation. Not only that, but he usually was the one to tell Nate what was going on in situations where Nate should've known on his own.

"Oh Scarlett, if you knew what I've gone through!" Ashley exclaimed. Blair remembered when she had last spoken to Nate. He had found out about her and Chuck, and he had said he never wanted to have anything to do with her again. He was feeling terrible, she knew it.

It was always about _him_. About how _he _felt. He never thought about how she would've felt as he pulled down Serena's dress that one fateful night. It was like her mother always said about this one businessman she knew: "he can dish out the crap but when it comes flying back at him he can't handle it." What a hypocrite.

Blair was startled from her thoughts again by Scarlett's voice.

"Ashley, you should've told me years ago that you loved her and not me, and not let me dangle with your talk of honor. But you had to wait now--now when Melly's dying--to show me that I could never mean anything to you then…this Watling woman does to Rhett."

Blair let out a sad laugh. The Watling woman was like Rhett's personal whore before he married Scarlett. Blair could just picture herself walking up to Nate and exploding, finally telling him:

"Why didn't you tell me years ago that you didn't love me?! You had to keep making me hope that I had a chance?! When really I could never mean more to you than those Victrola women do to Chuck?!"

"I've loved something that doesn't really exist," Scarlett said from the TV set. Blair's heart stopped. Suddenly an image of Nate flashed in her mind.

Nate, laughing heartily and flashing his gorgeous pearly whites. Nate, with his soft, tousled blonde hair. Nate, with his gentle voice and his calming ways. He would never love her; he never had. Blair had loved a dream for years that didn't even exist.

"And now…I don't care. Now it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter one bit," Scarlett said. Blair didn't stop the tears rolling down her cheeks this time. Even though she cried, she smiled wider than she ever had before. She realized it now. Now she knew.

She watched and cried as Scarlett ran back home to Rhett, only to find him packing away to leave her. The tears came quicker and sobs formed in her throat as the handsome and sorrowful Rhett walked out the door with his famous line:

"Frankly my dear, I don't give a damn."

Blair remembered when she had run back to Chuck, and he had said those cruel things. He had given her a cold glare, yet as she sat down she swore he looked very unhappy. She didn't care, for he made _her_ unhappy when he finally spoke and insulted her.

"You're like one of the Arabians my father used to own. Rode hard and put away wet," Chuck's deep voice echoed in her brain. "I don't want you anymore. And I can't see why anyone else would."

At the time she had hated him. She wondered why he would leave her, desolate and shattered, when he always used to be there. But now she realized that she had left him the same way weeks before on the staircase. He _did _care about her. He had wanted to hurt her the way that she had hurt him.

Blair had ordered her maid to bring a box of tissues, and they were all gone. Blair decided to be unladylike and use her sleeve to wipe her tears. Then she heard Miss Scarlett say:

"I'll go home! And I'll think of some way to get him back. After all, tomorrow…is another day!"

Blair stood up as soon as the words "The End" appeared onscreen. She stifled a few hard sobs, and quickly stood up.

"Mom! I'm going out to the Palace!" Blair called, running for her maid to get her jacket. Eleanor was home, a rare occasion.

"To see Serena?" her mother called out from another room. Blair sniffled and shook her head, although her mother couldn't see.

"No. Someone else. Someone I've always loved but I've never even realized it." Eleanor cocked an eyebrow in the other room, confused. There was only one other person who lived at the Palace that she knew of. When she ran to see what her daughter was up to, Blair was gone.

Blair rapped hardly at Chuck's hotel room door, the butterflies returning to her stomach. Her mascara had disappeared with her tears, but she didn't care. She just hoped that he wouldn't ignore her. She heard the doorknob turn slowly and the door suddenly flung open.

Chuck stared at her with wide eyes, obviously not expecting her. He kept his composure and leant coolly against the doorway. Blair gulped and looked down. She didn't want to face him so directly right away. She moved her head up slowly, and noticed that he wore nothing except his boxers and a white undershirt.

Blair's eyes moved from his abs to his strong arms. She tried not to smile as she remembered their night in the limo. She had never appreciated how good he looked until then. Nate always got the reputation as the hottest guy in school, but looking back Blair felt that Chuck was definitely hotter (and far superior in bed). That was another way they were alike. Blair always felt like she stood in the shadow of Serena, and she despised it.

Finally, Blair looked up at his face. She realized that Chuck looked very tired. Dark circles had formed under his gorgeous eyes, and his usually expressive face looked down and weary. His thick, dark brown hair was tousled and uncombed. He didn't look drunk, which was unusual for him. He just looked like he had a restless night--or a few.

Chuck's expression turned blank. Even his eyes, which were usually spry and animated, looked nothing but exhausted. Blair wanted him to do something: smirk, shake his head, anything. Anything but make it so that she couldn't read him.

Chuck folded his arms across his chest and leaned even more against the doorway. He sighed before speaking in his low, smooth voice.

"Waldorf."

"Chuck."

Chuck raised his eyebrows, surprised she didn't say "Bass" like she always did. Blair smiled, recognizing the Chuck she knew. He looked at her face and he felt torn apart. He wanted so badly to slam the door and move on to the self-loathing that he always felt after he always saw her. But he didn't. He just held it open and pinned her with questioning eyes.

"What are you doing here?" he asked harshly. "I told you, I don't want you anymore."

"I don't believe that, Chuck. I refuse to." Chuck laughed a little, shrugging her comment off. He tried to convince her more by flashing off a cocky smirk.

"I know this might sound incriminating to the ears of a princess who always gets what she wants, but…believe it."

"No. You care. Otherwise you wouldn't have looked so sad that night I came to see you at the bar. I mean, you're always moping about your dad when you drink, but you looked all too human that night. Like someone had hurt you. Me." Blair stepped forward. He ordered himself to step back, but his feet didn't move. "I know why you sent that text, Chuck. I understand now. I just wish I could've understood sooner. Then we both wouldn't have gotten hurt."

She held his intent gaze. Chuck's cocky smile had vanished from his face.

"You don't know," Chuck said, almost in a whisper. Blair smiled.

"I know you better than anyone, just like know me better than anyone." She leaned in closer, and her nostrils filled with the scent of scotch and expensive cologne. She put her hand up on his left shoulder, and she felt his body tense up. He continued looking down straight at her, his eyes wide. He almost looked…dare she say it…vulnerable?

"I love you, Chuck. I really love you." She paused for a minute, as tears began to come to her eyes. She struggled to keep her voice from shaking too hard. "I'm sorry for leaving you on the stairs that night, and I'm sorry about going back to Nate, and…I'm sorry for everything."

She drew herself even closer, her body heaving against his. He breathed in too, as if trying to hold back something. He had unfolded his arms, and now he was trying to resist hugging her.

"You said I was just a mistake," he whispered.

"You're not, you're not…" Blair looked down for a second, not wanting to blubber. When she looked back up, tears were streaming down her cheeks. "Nate was the mistake that I spent my whole life trying to make better." She took a deep breath before going on. "I'll completely understand if you don't love me anymore or can't forgive me. I honestly don't see how I could deserve it."

That was when she slowly leaned in and kissed him on the lips. It was very soft, but she still felt that happiness and safety. The feelings he had always given her, ever since the day she met him. He wrapped his arms around her as they sank deeper into the kiss. After a few moments, she gently pulled away and looked up. His facial features had softened, and his eyes seemed to glisten. She ran her hand up from his shoulder to his cheek. She had missed him so much. The way he felt, the way his lips tasted, the sound of his voice…she missed everything about him.

"I just wanted you to know," she finished. They stood there for a few moments in complete silence. She looked up at him, trying to tell what he was feeling. He looked down at her with a perplexed look. It was like he was focusing on her and on something else as well. Blair sighed and looked down.

"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have come." She wanted to say those words, but she didn't. Instead she gently pulled herself out of his arms. She turned around and began to slowly walk away. Her feet dragged against the ground, her heart weighing her down. She didn't stop her tears this time. She was too late.

"Blair!"

She stopped and turned back around, the tears coming at full blast. She looked and saw him, still standing in the doorway. The signs of his tiredness had completely disappeared. He smiled a genuine smile and his eyes looked bright and happy. Blair was almost shocked, for he had never looked that way before.

"You're more like the purebred that won the Kentucky Derby."

Blair's mouth dropped open. He smiled even more, whether in amusement or disbelief she didn't know.

"I love you too. I always have."

She couldn't believe her ears. He had forgiven her!

"Oh, Chuck!" she exclaimed gladly, so loud that all of the areas extended to the Lower West Side could've heard. She ran back to him and almost tripped in her high heels. Chuck immediately reacted, and bent down to catch her. She breathed out of shock and looked up at his concerned face.

"Are you alright?" he asked. She laughed and ran her hand up through his hair.

"Better than I ever have." Then he leaned down and kissed her. It was filled with passion and want. She smiled through the kiss and continued to cry tears of pure joy. He wanted _her_. After everything she had done, he still loved her. He still kissed her with the force and assurance that she loved. When they finished, she looked up into his dark brown eyes. She had forgotten what it felt like to have him hold her and look at her with such a confident manner.

"Did I ever tell you that you were always there to catch me when I fell?" Blair asked. Chuck smiled widely. She loved his smile. She had missed it so much.

"And I always will be," Chuck said. He suddenly looked saddened. "I felt so bad."

"For what?"

"For sending that text to Gossip Girl. I felt so guilty I could hardly with myself. I'm sorry, Blair. I really am." She smiled, hearing the sincerity in his voice. It was something only she heard.

"We'll get everything back to normal. We always have." Chuck smiled again, in disbelief. They were going to go official, without any secrets. They had both gotten what they were dreaming of, whether they knew that they were dreaming it all along or not.

Chuck suddenly put his one arm underneath Blair's back and his other under her legs. He lifted her up, and she laughed. Chuck's eyes slit and he gave her his traditional smirk.

"I remember something," he said.

"What?" she asked.

"I remember in eighth grade, when we came back from that party. You were drunk, and you asked Nathaniel to carry you up the stairs. He didn't." Blair figured she must have been pretty drunk, because she couldn't even remember the incident.

"You carried me, didn't you?" she asked. Chuck gave her that knowing smile.

"Just like now," he answered. Then he carried her into his room and closed the door behind him. Blair knew that she should be getting home; Eleanor was hosting a luncheon in an hour. But as Chuck laid her softly on the bed and crawled in next to her, she just laid her hand in his and let him kiss her again.

She would get other things done, eventually. After all, tomorrow was another day.

THE END


End file.
